


Just Friends

by MikeWritesThings



Category: Apex Legends (Video Games)
Genre: Awkward Flirting, Flirting, Fluff and Humor, Friends to Lovers, Kissing, M/M, Mutual Pining, innappropriate use of tabasco sauce, tw: copious mentions of overwatch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-22
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:47:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21523192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MikeWritesThings/pseuds/MikeWritesThings
Summary: “This isn't the time to be flirting with the enemy," Bangalore said, nudging his head with the butt of her gun. “Save it for the dropship.”“I wasn’t flirting,” Octane said defensively. “I was. Joking."[or: everyone else has to put up with Crypto and Octane's awkward flirting, and just want them to kiss already.]
Relationships: Crypto | Park Tae Joon/Octane | Octavio Silva, Lifeline | Ajay Che & Octane | Octavio Silva
Comments: 13
Kudos: 185





	Just Friends

**Author's Note:**

> emetophobia warning, if ur sensitive to that when u read "half an hour later, wraith" skip over the text and read after the next line break
> 
> so uhhh i finished this at 6k words and then proofread it and it ended up at 8k words. im so sorry . anyways cryptane fluff yeet
> 
> jami and kitty thankyou both for encouraging me and supporting me...especially u jami ur the real mvp...who else would i have cryptane to talk about with if it werent for u....ily

Mirage had been on the receiving end of Octane’s flirting before, and he’d enjoyed it. Being called ‘perfect’ in the middle of a match had boosted his ego, even if he did end up losing in the end, but it let him know one thing about Octane: he was a little sneak and would do anything it took to distract people.

Flirting was one of those things.

He’d learned to never take any of Octane’s flirting seriously, and so had everyone else. His flirting was meaningless, a joke, and everyone seemed to get that memo. His little comments, his overly affectionate gestures, his pet names, all seemed to be a big joke to him and to everyone else. 

Except Crypto.

Mirage watched it happen in live motion: crouched beside the two, sending out decoy after decoy and hoping the enemy would waste their ammo on it. Crypto had been downed by a well-timed shot from Wattson, and Octane had come running away from another attacking squad who had long lost sight of him. He would have revived Crypto himself, but, well, an incident from earlier was still fresh in his mind, and he was giving the other a taste of his own medicine. _Let’s see how_ you _like crawling around on the floor, Crypto._

“I gotcha,” Octane said, sliding into place beside them. He didn’t even seem out of breath despite sprinting a good two hundred meters, which Mirage both hated and envied. Octane pressed Crypto into the ground, and Mirage took note of the blood soaking the white skin of his neck. “Ah, she got you bad, huh? Man, you’re _lucky_ I like you.”

He jabbed the revive syringe into Crypto’s chest, and Mirage looked over just in time to see the other’s face scrunching up into confusion.

“Like me?” He asked, clearly confused, but Octane had already sped off to deal with the other squad on his own.

“Hey, come back!” Mirage called. “I’m not respawning you if you die!”

The only reply was a cackle, followed by gunshots. Mirage rolled his eyes and looked over at Crypto, as if to say _Can you believe this guy?_ But Crypto was healing up, eyes unfocused and staring into the distance. Mirage, misinterpreting his silence, said very unhelpfully, “Hey, don’t sweat it, kid. All the pros get downed sometimes.”

Crypto shot him a look of annoyance before disappearing behind the holoscreen of his drone.

* * *

“Whoa. Looks difficult,” a voice said, and Crypto glanced over his shoulder to see Octane peering at his screen through the gap of the shelves that divided their rooms. Entering a brief series of numbers pulled the page down and replaced it with something much more inane. He doubted Octane could understand all the code on his screen, but didn’t want to risk it anyways.

“Can I help you,” Crypto asked, but it wasn’t really a question.

“Oh! Yeah, I came to ask you something.” Octane disappeared briefly only to walk straight into Crypto’s room, uninvited. “I saw you playing Overwatch earlier!”

“That’s not a question,” Crypto said, somewhat defensively.

“Right, well, I was gonna ask if you want to play together.” He was still wearing his mask, but Crypto swore he could hear the smile in the other’s voice. “I’m a pretty good DPS.”

_DPS. Ugh._

“I don’t play that often,” Crypto lied, turning his back on the other. The last thing he needed was for the other to think they were friends, even if he was. Kind of. Cute.

“Ugghh, but nobody else plays,” Octane complained, before prodding Crypto’s shoulder rather harshly. “Come onnn, I need to get to masters, I’m stuck in diamond.”

They couldn’t even play together anyways. Crypto was a grandmaster. Despite the fact that he’d been the one to say they wouldn’t play together, he felt himself deflate a little in disappointment.

“Well, if you’re gonna be that way, adios,” Octane said, suddenly sounding much more despondent than earlier. He heard shuffling footsteps and the groan of the other’s chair, like he had just collapsed onto it. Crypto rolled his eyes and went back to work, fingers flying across his keyboard as he hacked his way through pages and pages of code. He’d put a backdoor here somewhere, but the incompetent head of security had added more code to protect itself from him. It wouldn’t stop him, but it was much more annoying to deal with.

He made several mistakes in the span of a minute, and cursed his attention for straying. He wasn’t actually thinking about playing with Octane. He only played competitive. Quickplay was too casual, and forget the arcade. Only children played the arcade. Even if he _wanted_ to play, they couldn't. Their rankings were too far apart.

Crypto tried to cover his tracks to leave behind no trace of his interference with the code, but grew more frustrated and distracted by the minute. He wasn’t going to play. _He wasn’t._ He only played a couple of times a week to keep his ranking up. He solo-queued. He had zero friends on battlenet. That wasn’t about to change.

“ _You’re lucky I like you,_ ” Octane’s voice suddenly said in his head, and he messed up so badly that the system detected an intruder and forcibly shut down the page, leading him to several _ERROR_ messages.

Oh, screw this.

“Alrada. One game,” Crypto said, and he heard the abrupt sound of Octane kicking something over.

“Really?!”

“ _One,_ ” Crypto repeated forcefully, booting the game up with a scowl. Stupid Octane and his. Cute. Flirting. Whatever that had been.

“Sweet!” Octane laughed, and he heard the crash of more things knocking over. “What’s your battletag?”

Their battletags were their names, mostly because Crypto was uncreative, though he didn’t know Octane’s excuse. They queued into a game together, less than ten feet away from each other, but Crypto was doing his best to ignore the other, which was kind of hard when you were playing video games together. As soon as the map loaded (freaking _Volskaya_ ) he gave a scoff when the other insta-locked Tracer. Typical.

The other healer instalocked Zenyatta, his favorite character, so he sighed and went with Mercy. When the spawn room loaded, he had only a brief second to see what skin the other had equipped—Lightning—before the other had blinked away, only to recall back and turn to look at him. Team chat popped up:

 **octane:** is that

 **octane:** mercys golden gun

 **crypto:** shut up

They played for one game, and won, and queued for another. Octane hardly seemed to notice, chattering away at a million miles an hour about which golden gun he was thinking about getting next. Crypto checked the other’s career profile and held back yet another scoff. Eighty-six hours on Tracer, followed by a whopping twenty-nine hours on Lúcio. The third hero was even worse: seven hours on Junkrat. This was the exact type of player he hated. He opened up chat and typed:

 **crypto:** so you are a tracer one-trick...

 **octane:** y r u typing this

 **octane:** im right behind u

 **octane:** also you have 60 hours on zenyatta so shut up

 **crypto:** and fifty-five on symmetra.

 **octane:** so????? am i supposed to be impressed???? 

**crypto:** and fifty-two on orisa.

 **octane:** cierra el pico???

 **crypto:** fifty-one on ana.

 **octane:** ur bullying me

 **octane:** this is bullying

 **octane:** u only played mercy for 3 competitive seasons straight why are u coming after me like this

He heard Octane laugh behind him, and tried not to smile. The game loaded (Oasis), and only then did Octane say out loud, “Hey, what happened to just one game?”

“You didn’t suck,” Crypto said.

“I should hope so.” He wasn’t facing Octane, but he could tell the other had perked up a little at the praise. He could hear the glee in the other’s voice. “I’m not diamond for nothing.”

“Not as good as grandmaster.”

“Hey!” Octane whined, indignant, and Crypto thought it was endearing rather than annoying. He buried his face in his hands after selecting his character, willing himself to calm down and focus. _Shut up. Stop thinking Octane’s cute. Stop it._

“Carry meeeee,” Octane continued whining, and Crypto knew he was already failing when he mumbled out, 

“Fine.”

* * *

Bangalore had seen a lot of things in her thirty-five years of life. War, battles long-fought and hard-won, friends torn away from the land of the living. She’d also run into a lot of idiots, and Octane was definitely one. She tried not to think on the past too much, but he reminded her of the sort of soldier who’d run into battle and either survive with an insane amount of luck or get gunned down the moment they set foot in no man’s land.

Yes, he was an idiot, but he was also a good kid, so she didn’t really object to having him on her squad that much. He found the good loot before everyone else, and his luck with level four knockdown shields had won a game countless times.

But she must put emphasis on the fact that he was an _idiot._

His orange marker on her minimap had been awfully still for an awfully long time, so still that she had decided to go investigate. If Octane wasn’t racing around the map, it was a sign that something was wrong. Hiking up the hill to where Octane was standing stationary, she heard a familiar whirring sound—the sound of a drone.

“Silva!” She called, Peacekeeper held tightly in her hands. “Let’s get moving!”

The next thing she saw made her stop right in her tracks.

Octane was crouched low on an outcropping of rocks, weapons sheathed, and making hearts with his hands at the drone positioned only twenty feet away from him. The lens of the drone was green, indicating that not only was Octane making hearts at the drone, Crypto was actively watching his stupid little display.

Bangalore’s bewilderment overtook her for a second, only to be replaced by annoyance. She didn’t even bother aiming properly, merely firing at the drone from her hip, and it fell to the ground in pieces.

“Wh—hey!” Octane’s indignant voice yelped, and he scrambled off the rock, moving to investigate the pieces of the drone. He kicked aside a couple of painted white chips with his foot before complaining, “Porque hiciste eso? We were communicating!”

“This isn’t the time to fool around, Silva, we’re in the middle of a game,” Bangalore said through gritted teeth, and stomped over to where he was still staring dejectedly at the destroyed drone. Grabbing him by the scruff of his neck, she dragged him away, back down the hill so they could set up defenses in case Crypto tried to send reinforcements. Oldest trick in the book. Why did Octane fall for it, or even entertain the other? Crypto’s squad could be breathing down their necks already. She instinctively glanced over her shoulder to make sure nobody was taking aim at her head, but no one was there.

Shoving Octane into one of the buildings near the geyser, she kicked the door shut behind her and checked to make sure that their third teammate was right where she’d left him.

“You ruin all the fun,” Octane was still complaining. “Loosen up a little, amiga.”

If Bangalore wasn't a professional, she would have crushed Octane beneath her fist by this point. Kid probably weighed a hundred and fifteen pounds soaking wet. It'd be too easy.

"What's fun about putting yourself in danger?" She asked, but instantly knew he was the worst possible person to ask this question when he instantly launched into a flurry of words describing how _amazing_ almost dying felt. She breathed in deeply, holding her breath, before exhaling. 

Idiots. She was. Surrounded. By idiots. If Octane wasn’t so quick on his feet and so good with a R-99 she’d have tossed him into the geyser by now.

“We don’t have time for you to flirt with the enemy,” Bangalore said, cutting off Octane's tirade and nudging his head with the butt of her gun. “Save it for the dropship.”

“I wasn’t flirting,” Octane said, voice getting rather high-pitched. “I was joking around.”

Bangalore remembered him the previous day, invading Crypto’s space and draping himself all over the other, poking his face teasingly before sitting on the other’s bed and talking at a million words a minute. She wasn’t an expert on romance, but she also wasn’t blind.

“Whatever you say,” she said, and reloaded her Peacekeeper. “C’mon, Crypto can’t be far. Let’s go hunt 'em down.”

* * *

“So I’m not really good at cooking,” Octane began the conversation like that, holding up a plate that held what looked like a pile of black sludge. “But I _did_ try.”

Crypto looked up from the book he had been reading. He was leaning against his wall, jacket in his lap and intending on relaxing for once, though the person in his room was bound to make him feel everything _but_ relaxed. He looked down at the dish, eyebrows raised, and his nose scrunch up a little in disdain.

“Is that…” Crypto trailed off, because he didn’t even know what he was supposed to be looking at. “Bulgogi?”

“Yes!” Octane said, evidently relieved that the other at least knew what the atrocity on the dish was supposed to be. “Bluegogi!”

“Bulgogi,” Crypto repeated.

“Tomato, tomato. Anyways, I looked up a recipe and tried to make it. To the best of my ability. Except I don’t know what gochujang is so I just used Tabasco sauce.”

_Tabasco sauce._

Crypto debated opening the dropship window and making a run for it.

“Why?” He asked, shoving his book aside. He couldn’t focus on it right now, not with that... _thing,_ staring up at him, and mocking him from its plate. This awful attempt at Korean cuisine was enough to spark interest in the darker part of him, the part filled with morbid curiosity.

“Oh, well, I just thought it’d be fun,” Octane said, waving his hand flippantly, and it was so obviously a lie but Crypto didn’t feel like pursuing the truth right now. He had just discovered that the green onions had been doused in what was undoubtedly the Tabasco sauce. He was afraid. And also slightly endeared by Octane's nervousness.

The plate was suddenly shoved under his nose, and Crypto physically recoiled.

“Wanna try it?” Octane asked, and Crypto actually _hesitated._ This was a poorly veiled attempt to spend time with him, and the other had gone through all the effort of learning a Korean recipe for him. It touched his heart, even if he didn’t particularly care for bulgogi.

Even if he had used Tabasco sauce, even if he had burned the beef, he had tried. He was genuinely trying. And Crypto thought that was awfully... _cute._

Then again, this could _also_ be an attempt to poison him.

“C’moooon,” Octane said, and produced a fork from out of nowhere. “Please?”

So Crypto sighed and took the plate from the other, and the fork as well. He felt awfully numb, like his body had decided to put up its defenses already to ward off an intruder, the intruder being mushy black bulgogi. He stabbed a piece of beef with his fork and lifted it to his lips, but it fell apart and dribbled onto the plate. They were both quiet for a minute.

“I mean,” Octane said. “You don’t. _Have_ to eat it. On second thought.”

“It’s fine. Thank. You,” Crypto said, trying not to sound so stiff, but his throat had closed up the moment he brought another forkful near his mouth.

_Here goes nothing._

At first, it seemed rather anticlimactic. It tasted like burned beef, which wasn’t a _good_ taste, but it also wasn’t as horrible as the look of the dish gave the impression of. It just tasted like burned beef and soy sauce. All in all, he’d eaten worse when on the run from the authorities.

And then the Tabasco sauce hit him like a truck and he coughed violently.

“Oh god,” Octane said, sounding rather distressed. “Don’t die. Dios mío, do you need some water?”

“This is fine,” Crypto lied, and shoved another forkful in his mouth. God, why did he do that. He was going to die of food poisoning. “This is good.”

“You’re crying,” Octane noted.

“Because,” and here Crypto struggled to think of something nice to say. “It’s hot.”

He could not see Octane’s face, but the other visibly perked up at that, and he could practically feel the other beaming.

“Really?” He asked enthusiastically. “It’s good?”

Crypto ate two more bites before setting the plate beside him, and he could physically feel his throat convulsing with the effort of swallowing the food. Octane didn’t seem one bit dejected that he’d only ate four whole bites, and bounced excitedly on his feet, excitement palpable.

“I really tried,” he was saying, and Crypto hated that he thought the other’s enthusiasm was cute. “Like, I didn’t know what half the instructions meant and I was kind of like dude what the hell is gochujang but then it said it was some sort of red pepper thing and I was like oh so it’s spicy so Tabasco sauce should be fine right but then the meat got burned but it still looked like the picture so I—”

“Thank you,” Crypto said, cutting him off, and Octane scooped up the plate before running off with it, hopefully to dump it in the garbage. He felt a burp rise in his throat and stifled it behind his fist, which was a mistake, because it was awfully hot and made his stomach churn.

Half an hour later, Wraith discovered him on the floor, clinging onto the toilet and trying to keep the contents of his stomach from escaping. This was only the second most embarassing experience of his life, right after that time he'd called Mila _noona_ for the first time.

“Why did you even eat it,” Wraith asked tonelessly. “I sat there and watched.”

“It was,” Crypto stifled another burp that was also half vomit. “Made for me.”

“You cried,” she pointed out.

“It was a gift.”

“You’re throwing up.”

“Go away,” Crypto said. “Why are you even here?”

“Because I have to use the bathroom,” Wraith said, “And Octane is in the other bathroom trying to flush all that food down the toilet.”

* * *

Lifeline had been friends with Octane for about a decade. They’d met in their last year of middle school, gone to high school together, and then departed after graduation. That was a good five years, and sure, their communication after that had been minimal, but she considered herself an expert on all things Octane-related, and she knew that, without a doubt, Octane was flirting with Crypto.

And Crypto was playing along.

At first, she had thought this was a one-sided thing. Typical Octane, getting up to things he had no right getting up to and being annoyingly persistent and chasing after guys who were clearly not interested. It happened twice in high school, first with Darryn Wu (Octane’s first real heartbreak, and it had resulted in the other egging the other’s house out of anger) and then Max Higgins, who had gone so far as to attempt to file a restraining order against Octane.

(“I didn’t even do anything,” Octane had complained into the bowl of ice cream Lifeline had given him. “Is showing up to his games illegal? No! He’s just an ass! And I paid _money_ for that cheerleading costume!”)

It seemed that he was still persistent now, but, at the very least, more cautious about it, because sometimes he approached Crypto hesitantly, like he was afraid of getting his head bitten off. Not that Lifeline supported his romantic endeavors, but anything that made the other exercise caution was a good lesson for him.

She was watching Octane out of the corner of her eye, torn between telling him off for how close his face was to his computer screen and also wanting to revel in the headache he would receive tomorrow. He was playing Overwatch, and mashing his keyboard so hard that she was afraid she’d break the keys, and he was _also_ yelling.

“I need healing!” He was saying loudly. “I NEED HEALING!”

He then gave a little scream, presumably being attacked.

“I’M GONNA DIE.”

He didn’t even have a headset on. He was just screaming at his screen.

“DUUUUUDE,” Octane whined at the top of his lungs, and Lifeline realized with a jolt that he was addressing Crypto when he leaned to the side to look into the other’s room. “YOU’RE DOING THIS ON PURPOSE.”

“Can you stop yelling?” Caustic asked scathingly from his own room, but went unheard.

Crypto was playing Overwatch as well, and Lifeline rubbed at her eyes to make sure she wasn’t seeing things. He had been hunched over his computer, so she'd assumed he was up to his usual hacker-y stuff, but now, she realized, he was very clearly playing a game. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Crypto said coolly, in a dismissive sort of voice. “It’s not my fault someone refuses to stand still so I can heal them.”

“You’re playing Zenyatta,” Octane fired back. “I don’t _need_ to stand still.”

Crypto didn’t respond, and Lifeline assumed Octane had finally gotten healed, because he was silent for another thirty seconds. She tried to return her attention to the TV that was on, but the movie hadn't gotten any more interesting since the last time she checked. She and Wattson had been watching it together, but the other had fallen asleep on the opposite end of the couch curled up into a ball, so the movie had suddenly lost all its fun.

“WHY DID YOU SWITCH,” Octane shouted, startling her from her thoughts.

“I like Ana,” Crypto said simply. “Now stand still, so I can heal you.”

Octane gave a loud groan that seemed to echo throughout the room.

“Tav,” Lifeline spoke up, for the first time in a while. “My eardrums are bleedin’.”

She went ignored as Octane got to his feet, evidently having just died. He stomped over to where Crypto calmly sat at his computer, and Lifeline noticed now that he too did not have a headset on.

“You’re throwing,” Octane accused.

“This is Quickplay,” Crypto said back.

“I keep dying!”

“Then stop being such a bad player,” Crypto said, turning his head to look at Octane, and Lifeline was surprised to see that despite his tone, he was smiling lightly. “You should treat your healers nicer.”

“Is it because I’m Tracer?” Octane ignored the other. “I can switch if you promise to heal me.”

“Hmm. How about tank?”

Lifeline knew enough about Overwatch and Octane in general to know that he hated playing tanks. They felt slow and bulky, and for someone who desired fast-paced gameplay, not an option. But Octane was persistent in his attempts to get along with Crypto, so he cocked his head to the side and asked, “Promise?”

“I’ll pocket you if you play tank,” Crypto said, and Octane gave a long-suffering sigh before finally agreeing. Lifeline watched Octane shuffle back to his computer, looking faintly annoyed already by the prospect of playing tank, and her gaze slid back over to Crypto to see him staring after the other man, expression still the most relaxed she’d ever seen it, before he turned his attention back to his game.

Crypto, Lifeline realized, was flirting right back. In his own way. She wondered if Octane had realized that by now.

“D.va,” Octane said.

“No,” Crypto said. “We have a Zarya. Play main tank.”

“Ugggghhh. Fine. Only for you.”

“I’m honored,” Crypto said sarcastically, and Octane gave a genuine laugh.

The flirting was giving her a physical headache, so Lifeline got to her feet and headed down to the kitchens, leaving the others alone in their playing.

Two hours later, she confronted Octane upfront about it.

"You two are datin', right?"

Octane paused in his eating, glancing up at her from his cereal. They were alone, so he had taken off his mask for the first time in a long while. She feared that he showered in that thing, but his hair seemed clean enough, if not matted to his forehead due to the helmet.

"Who's dating?" He asked, evidently confused. Lifeline crossed her arms, unimpressed.

"You and Crypto."

Octane blinked at her, eyes wide and evidently shocked. He then threw his head back and laughed, spoon dropping into his bowl with a clatter, like that was perhaps the _funniest_ thing he'd ever heard. Lifeline waited for him to finish, tapping her fingers against her bicep in a minor show of impatience. Finally Octane calmed down, picking his spoon back up and shovelling his sugary cereal into his mouth.

" _No._ What makes you think _that,_ chica?" He giggled, mouth full.

"Uh-huh. Sure," Lifeline said. "You can tell me if you're dating. I won't tell everyone else."

"But we're not," Octane said. "We're just friends."

"You're flirting with him," Lifeline accused.

"Because, uh, he's really hot, in case you haven't noticed."

"And he's flirting back."

Octane paused. "You really think so?"

"I'm just guessin'." Lifeline hesitated, before sliding into the seat beside him and pouring herself some cereal too. "He's not a very open guy. But he likes talking to you, I can tell."

She watched Octane out of the corner of her eye, and saw that he was now fiddling with his hair, a faraway look in his eyes.

"That so?" He mumbled.

"Yeah," Lifeline said, and smiled. "I think so."

There was a pleasant and comfortable pause. Then, his chair scraped backwards with an awful screeching sound, and he practically threw his dirty bowl into the sink.

"Thanks, amiga!" Octane said loudly, leaning in to kiss her on the cheek before sprinting away, making _way_ too much noise for two in the morning. Lifeline stared after him, somewhat bewildered. What had she done?..

* * *

Octane was not a big fan of the Epicenter or its surrounding areas. The snow was slippery and made running a pain, and was especially hard on his prosthetics, as he could not tread as lightly as others could. The frosty wind bit at his arms and abdomen, and since the ground was so unstable he couldn’t even run to keep his body temperature up. This weakness had been exploited before by others, but their Jumpmaster was a newbie who decided to land them at the Epicenter anyways, so he assumed they didn’t know that about him yet. Well, they were about to find out the hard way.

He had managed to get his hands on a Spitfire and a P2020 before running into others, and he did not score a single kill, only managing to do a lot of damage. He picked a shield off a dead body before sprinting towards another building to take shelter and heal up. He slid on the ice and ended up landing hard on his ass, which, great. That was exactly how this game was going so far.

The only upside was the fact that his other squadmate was Crypto.

They had made brief eye contact when dropping, and he’d done his best to seem confident even if he could already feel his teeth chattering. Crypto had gave him a brief nod before breaking off, and he hadn’t seen him since. Glancing quickly at his squadmates' stats, he saw that they both only had level one bodyshields whilst he had managed to snag a level two. Crypto was stationary, clearly using his drone to scout the area before crossing out in the open, but their newbie teammate was firing at somebody.

Octane swapped his P2020 for a G7 before making a break for it, sliding across the ice and making his way to Crypto’s location. He’d do better with him than the newbie, that was for sure.

“Hola,” Octane said by way of greeting, and Crypto’s unfocused eyes blinked before fixing him with a stare.

“Hi,” he said after a long while. 

“Nice weather we’re having, huh?” Octane joked, and suppressed a shiver. Crypto’s expression didn’t change much, aside from a thinning of his mouth.

“If you say so.”

This was not going well. Octane turned away under the pretense of rifling through his inventory, but in reality was trying to think of something _cool_ to say, or at least a good pick-up line. At the same time, he was also debating on just staying silent, because he never knew when he would finally accidentally say something that would make Crypto retreat back into his shell.

“I’VE BEEN DOWNED,” their teammate suddenly yelled in their ears, interrupting Octane’s train of thought, and they both flinched. Their teammate screamed for a couple more seconds more before being silenced, and they both stood stock-still, listening for any indication of an approaching enemy squad. Crypto slowly got to his feet, unholstering his Wingman, before turning to Octane with half a smirk.

“That’s what you sound like when we play Overwatch,” he said, before sliding down the zipline onto the first floor, leaving Octane open-mouthed in shock that quickly turned to indignation.

“I do not, I sound _way_ sexier than that guy!”

He relaxed as he slid down to join Crypto and was greeted with half a smile, feeling more comfortable to keep up the friendly talk they’d been managing the past few weeks. He’d been almost afraid that Crypto wouldn’t allow conversation like this to continue in the arena, but was gladly proven wrong.

They kept up the banter as they moved from building to building, looting, and Octane suddenly didn’t mind the fact that he had to slow down here in the cold. Slowing down just a little bit was worth it if he got to talk to Crypto like this, light-hearted and without the barriers the other usually had up.

A squad walked in on them in the middle of an argument over who should take an extended heavy mag, but they fell dead within seconds. They had excellent synergy for a pair that had never worked together before now, and Octane chalked it up to the amount of video games they’d been playing in the past few weeks.

“We should start moving deeper in the ring,” Crypto suggested once they had both gotten a decent amount of healables and ammo. “Let’s hike up to the Refinery.”

And then the reality of their environment crashed down on Octane. He always liked a challenge, but plainly hated the cold and the snow. He decided not to voice this out loud in case Crypto decided he’d be useless in a future battle, and instead jammed stim into his neck, sprinting ahead in an attempt to feel warmer. It worked, somewhat. The plan fell apart when he skidded over ice and face-planted right into a pile of snow.

He was truly shivering now, and not for the first time, cursed his choice to wear a croptop in the games. Sliding out of the snow, he realized a lot of it had stuck to his skin and even more had gotten in places where there should _never_ be snow. The freezing cold powder was especially concentrated in the collar of the cropped jacket he wore beneath his vest, and he knew that was gonna be a bitch later once it melted. 

Crypto approached, having the gall to look amused.

"Lose your footing?" He asked teasingly, _really,_ in such a light-hearted manner that it caught Octane off-guard and he gave a laugh despite his predicament.

"Legit think I'm gonna freeze my balls off right n-n-now," he said, teeth chattering even more audibly than before. "Hijo de puta, whose _idea_ was this in the first place?"

Crypto gave him a strange look, like he had only just now realized something.

"You are cold?"

Octane gestured to his trembling body and, more importantly, his completely exposed stomach and arms. "Well, _yeah._ "

The next thing that happened made Octane’s brain short circuit. He wasn’t sure if it had _really_ happened for a second, and thought that his stim was finally producing the hallucinogenic effects Lifeline claimed it would. But the weight over his shoulders was very real, as well as the sudden warmth he felt all over.

“Oh,” Octane said, rather dumbly.

He was now being engulfed by Crypto’s very large, very puffy, and very heavy jacket. The collar went up so high on his face that when he turned his head, the green lining was all he saw. The sleeves extended several inches past his fingers and the bottom of the jacket nearly reached his knees. There was no possible way he could run in this without tripping, or fire a gun with the way his hands were covered.

“Gracias,” Octane said anyways, because it was the thought that counts, and man, this was super cute. He was glad his mask was covering up the large, gleeful smile on his face, a smile so big it was starting to hurt. This felt like the sort of teen movie moment where he would be rolling around on his bed, kicking his legs and squealing. _His jacket! He gave me his jacket!!_

“De nada,” Crypto replied, and Octane felt his heart do something funny.

“Spanish? For me? I must be special, huh, cariño?” Octane didn’t know if he was pushing his luck, reading the signs correctly, going too far. He was afraid, and yet, at the same time, not. He remembered Lifeline’s words, about how Crypto was opening up to him, but he was trying not to get his hopes up, even though he was sure now that Crypto _must_ be flirting back.

“Do not push your luck,” Crypto said, slipping his hands into the pockets of his pants. He didn’t look the slightest bit cold. “Let’s get going.”

“I think you might just like me,” Octane teased, skipping ahead of the other and carefully avoiding large patches of ice. He intentionally kept his head forward, but was peering out of the corner of his eye, hoping to catch a glimpse of something, and he was rewarded by the sight of Crypto smiling. A small smile, but it was still a smile.

_Maybe she was right after all..._

“Just think of it as a 'thank you’ for the bulgogi,” Crypto mumbled, glancing down at his minimap, as if trying to appear nonchalant.

“The bulgogi you got food poisoning over?”

“I think ‘food poisoning’ is too extreme of a term. But yes. _That_ bulgogi.”

“Well, I—”

A bullet struck the ground right in between them.

“I don’t like my odds of surviving in this jacket!” Despite his statement, he was already frantically injecting stim with a feeling of excitement. _Finally, the fun is beginning._

“Would you rather freeze?” Crypto asked, shooting at the enemy squad ahead, causing them to scatter. 

“Hell no!" Octane shouted, and started sprinting for cover as more lead rained upon them. “This is the comfiest shit I’ve ever worn!”

* * *

“Are they _still_ flirting,” Gibraltar asked, but it wasn’t really a question.

Bloodhound barely glanced up from where they were sharpening their axe.

“It would seem so,” they said, disinterested.

The people in question were none other than Octane and Crypto, who were sitting on Octane’s beanbag together and watching a movie. Octane was still dressed in Crypto’s jacket, even though that jacket had been the sole reason they lost the match earlier in the day. Octane, not used to having so much loose clothing on his body, had accidentally shut a door on the hem of the jacket, leading to his untimely demise at the hands of a grenade. He hadn’t taken it off yet, however, and Crypto apparently hadn’t asked for it back.

Gibraltar had played these exact types of games before with his own boyfriend back home, and quite frankly, it was both amusing and tiring to watch the two flirt with each other like this. He wasn’t entirely sure they could _tell_ if the other was flirting, either. Octane was too air-headed and Crypto too serious.

Or maybe they did know the other was flirting, but they weren’t _doing_ anything about it. This was painful.

Octane had finally taken his mask off. It was the first time Gibraltar had seen the other without it, because he literally slept in that thing, and he was rather surprised by his youthful face. He looked more like a high-schooler than an adult, with freckles and wide eyes, though his mischievous smile was exactly what Gibraltar expected. He watched Crypto mumble something inaudible and Octane elbowed him hard, giving him a big smile. Crypto smiled back, in an almost shy kind of way, and it was truly sickening to watch.

“I think they’re very good friends!” Pathfinder supplied unhelpfully from where he was decorating the Christmas tree. It was some dumb tradition that nobody remembered the reason for, but Pathfiner had read about it somewhere and was eager to impress everyone with his decorating skills. Even if most of the tinsel was currently wrapped around his torso and knotted in the back like a bow. “They share clothes! I think that is neat! I wish someone would share clothes with me!”

“You don’t wear clothes,” Gibraltar pointed out.

“That is not the point! The gesture would be appreciated.”

“Tell you what, I’ll give you one of my shirts if you clean up the mess you made.”

Pathfinder looked down at the number of ornaments strewn across the floor. “Okay! Will do.”

Gibraltar went to get Pathfinder one of his shirts, and passed by Crypto and Octane as he did so. They were side-by-side, pressed so close to one another that if he didn’t know any better, he would assume they were about to cuddle. But while they were close, there was still a certain feeling in the air, like they were both tiptoeing across an invisible line drawn between them, almost afraid of crossing it. He never thought Octane would be afraid of anything, but this situation, it seemed, was more delicate than others with someone as protective and secretive like Crypto.

He caught a bit of their conversation on his way back:

“We are not watching the sequel,” Crypto was saying, arms crossed over his chest like that would protect him from the other's persistence. “I hated that.”

“But the sequel’s even better!” Octane argued, placing his head right on Crypto’s shoulder. “Por favorrrrrrr? For meeeee?"

Gibraltar didn’t hear Crypto’s answer, and instead walked right up to Pathfinder, handing him one of his favorite shirts that read _HUG CHAMPION._

“Here you go.”

“Wow!” Pathfinder’s screen displayed ‘:D’, followed by heart eyes. “I will indeed become a hug champion! Thank you!”

“No problem, brotha.” Gibraltar sat back down next to Bloodhound, and looked over at the two in the corner to see if they had departed. They were still sitting together, still staring at the screen in their laps, and he figured that Crypto had caved in to the other. He watched Octane lean his head against Crypto’s shoulder again, and this time he stayed there, unmoving.

They were sweet to watch, but he just wished they’d kiss already.

* * *

Octane approached Crypto with a large box in his hands, buzzing with energy that he was doing his best to hold back lest he dropped it. It took the other a moment for him to notice Octane, but when he did he paused what he was doing and turned to face him, eyebrows raised.

“Pizza?” Octane waved the box a little 

Crypto smiled, and Octane treasured it.

“ _Eung._ What's the occasion?"

"A _lo siento_ for the bulgogi. I'll never try _that_ again."

"Promise?"

"Oh, shut up."

They sat on Crypto’s bed together, pulling out slices and eating side-by-side. Octane had smushed two slices together and was eating it like a sandwich, and though Crypto snubbed his nose in mock disgust, he didn’t say anything about it, chewing in silence. 

Octane liked this silence. It wasn't as good as talking, not as good as hearing the other's voice, but just sitting here next to him and eating quietly was enjoyable on its own.

Normally, Octane would have hated being this still. Every moment he’d spent with Crypto in these past few weeks were the stillest he’d ever been: watching a movie together, eating together. No matter what activity, he felt slowed down and stationary. Which...honestly? He didn’t particularly mind that much. Sure, there was that ever-present itch at the base of his spine, his skull, in his heart, telling him to _go go go,_ but that itch would never be satisfied regardless. He found that being still and being quiet with Crypto was never boring, and the itch never got overwhelming like it has when he was still living with his parents.

Now _that_ was crazy.

As a matter of fact, if Octane truly thought about it, he didn't feel like he was being stationary with Crypto at all. Physically, yes, they were relaxed, side-by-side, unmoving, but he _always_ felt like something was moving every time they talked, that the rushing of his heart was all the adrenaline he needed in that moment. It was a new sensation, but one he thoroughly enjoyed. He _liked_ Crypto, liked his sense of humor and the way he was cool but also the biggest dork in the universe. He liked his soft hands and his big jacket and the attractive tilt to his lips. He liked so many things about Crypto, and he couldn’t even begin to list them all.

So, he said, with as much casual confidence as he could,

“We should go out sometime.”

“I agree,” Crypto said instantly, and Octane’s head whipped around to face the other, mouth dropped open in shock. “We spend all our time in the dropship or in the arena. A change of pace will be nice.”

_Oh._

“That’s.” Octane cleared his throat, suddenly feeling unsure, but he’d be damned if he went back on his words right now. “Not what I meant.”

Crypto now looked confused.

“I meant. Like. Going out. On a date," Octane explained, voice getting a little weaker towards the end.

“Oh,” the other man said, like he didn't quite know how to react.

They were both quiet for a really long time after that, staring at one another, as if waiting to say ‘haha, just kidding!’ But that never happened, and then, steadily, Crypto’s cheeks started to flush pink.

“Oh,” he said again, and the sound made a series of nervous words bubble past Octane's lips in an attempt to save the situation.

“I just think we’ve been getting along really well like more than just a friendly compadre way and I dunno if I’ve been misinterpreting everything but it seems like you like me too and I just think that we would be good together but if you don’t want to do it that’s fine as long as we can keep playing Overwatch together and kicking ass in the games then we should be fi—”

“Octane,” Crypto said, voice surprisingly steady and cutting off his rant. “Breathe.”

“I’m breathing,” he said, kind of annoyed that he’d been interrupted, but thankful all the same, because he could have gone on _forever_ and that would have been embarrassing. 

“I will go out with you,” Crypto said carefully, and Octane perked up instantly, hardly believing his ears. His heart was beating fast once again, quickening his breath and making his head roar. “But there are a few conditions we must follow.”

“What?” Octane asked eagerly, but Crypto just shook his head.

“Not now. Not here.” Crypto’s eyes scanned the room, as if looking for something in particular. They lingered on everything, trusting nothing, before he blinked and looked back at Octane. “But I will date you. I like you.”

“It’s hard not to like me,” said Octane. “I look incredibly cute.”

“Hmm.”

“That’s not a ‘no’. That means you agree.”

“I never said that.”

“It was implied in the _hmm._ ” He shoved at Crypto’s shoulder lightly, fighting back a large grin. “So we’re definitely boyfriends now, yeah?”

“We are,” Crypto said, a little haltingly. “We can be.”

He then did a little weird movement with his hand, before slowly wrapping his arm around Octane’s shoulders, and pressing him lightly against his side. Octane stilled, heart still beating at an abnormal rate, and struggled to appear nonchalant about this new position. He wondered if this was an invitation to kiss, or cuddle, or...something else. He was half in the other's lap, after all, and his imagination was now going wild.

"Pizza date?" Mirage's voice carried over, interrupting their little moment, and they both looked up from where they sat, wide-eyed. "Sweet, can I have some?"

He stretched over, flipping the box open, only to freeze once he got a glimpse of what was inside.

"Pineapple," he said in an almost disbelieving voice, before looking up at them with mingled disgust and awe. "You two are perfect for each other. You're awful terrible people and I'm disgusted by you both."

“Vete a la chingada, Witt,” Octane said, taking a slice from the box and throwing it at him. “Can’t you see we’re having a moment?”

“Jeez,” Mirage complained. “Well, if you two are finally together, please don’t have sex. My room is like, right there.”

“Shut up,” Crypto hissed.

“Okay, I can tell when I’m not wanted! Later!”

They fall back into silence once again, Octane still half-pulled into Crypto's lap and not quite knowing where to put his hands. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Crypto turned to look at him again, and Octane realized that their faces were extremely close.

“Uh,” he said, very intelligently. “We good?”

Crypto smiled.

“Yah,” he said in affirmation, and they both leaned forward at the same time.

The kiss was really simple in real life, nice and easy and a little press of their lips together. In Octane’s mind, however, explosions were going off. Fireworks were igniting. The _BOOMS_ were shaking the metaphorical floor of his head. And amidst it all, he was screaming, _HE’S MY BOYFRIEND NOW!!!!!!!!_

When they pulled away, Crypto said, “You’re cute.”

“So you admit it,” Octane replied, trying not to let it show that there were still flames going up in his mind.

“Hmm.” 

Crypto's arm slid away from his shoulder and he felt him place his hands on his waist, holding him securely in place. Neither of them said anything for a long time, afraid they would accidentally ruin what they had going on. Soon, the silence started eating Octane up from the inside, so he said, 

“You can call me Octavio now. Tav or Tavi for short, but if you call me Oc I’ll kill you. Literally.”

“Tavi-yah is cute,” Crypto said, and god, Octane could listen to him call him cute all day, it made his chest feel fuzzy and his head feel stupid. 

“What’s _your_ real name, huh?” He asked, finally deciding to slide his hands up and grip the other's shoulders.

“That’s a part of the conditions I mentioned earlier," Crypto answered, leaning forward to kiss Octane again. “Let’s not worry about that yet.”

* * *

“For the love of god,” Caustic growled, sounding the angriest Mirage had ever heard him. “Can you two. _Stop. Flirting._ ”

If Mirage had been on the receiving end of that anger, he would have obeyed instantly with an ‘aye-aye captain’ for good measure. Octane just laughed, however, hands on his hips with his usual carefree attitude.

“You can’t prove shit,” he said smugly, and didn’t even falter when Caustic pointed in the corner of the room where Crypto’s drone clearly buzzed. “Yeah, but you can’t prove we’re _flirting._ ”

“We’re in the middle of a game right now,” Mirage piped up. “I support the fact that you’re breaking Crypto out of his shell and making him less of a bitch, but also, we should be killing people right now, not blowing kisses at drones.”

“You kissed Lifeline’s drone once,” Octane reminded him.

“Because I was _dying_ and it was _healing me!_ ”

Caustic looked like he was debating on using his own squadmates as test subjects. The expression only got worse when Octane went right back to blowing kisses at the drone, even making little finger hearts.

“I miss,” Caustic mumbled under his breath gruffly, picking up one of his traps with extreme force. “When they were just friends.”

Mirage thought back to the long, painful periods of time where he watched them smile at each other and touch each other cautiously, always afraid they were accidently crossing the line.

"Well, I _don't,_ " he said, flipping his hair out of his face and sending out a decoy. "Even if it _is_ actively interfering with my win streak."

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT NOV 30: edited for more accurate korean! 
> 
> i would like to formally apologize for the amount of overwatch in this
> 
> translations:
> 
> korean:
> 
> alrada: fine/alright  
> bulgogi: marinated beef, a korean dish  
> gochujang: a spicy red chili paste used in bulgogi. tabasco sauce is not a recommended subsitute for gochujang  
> noona: korean honorific that means "older sister" but doesn't necessarily reference a familial relationship. in this context tho it is indicative of a familial relationship lol  
> eung: yes [informal]  
> yah: very similar to how people in english say hey/yeah  
> 'tavi-yah': ah/yah is a suffix you would attach to someone's name to indicate a personal relationship. it depends on if the name ends in a vowel or not. taejoon would be taejoon-ah and octane is octavio-yah (shortened to tavi-yah as a nickname)
> 
> spanish:
> 
> cierro el pico: shut up  
> porque hiciste eso: what did you do that for ?!?!  
> dios mío: oh my god  
> hijo de puta: son of a bitch  
> lo siento: sorry  
> vete a la chingada: fuck off
> 
> im mexican so all my spanish is local and/or googled...😔
> 
> feedback is always appreciated!! this fandom is so small and this is such a rarepair that sometimes i get discouraged from writing things. a review rly makes my day!
> 
> [tumblr](https://seerofmike.tumblr.com)  
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/tsodmike?s=09)  
> 


End file.
